One of India`s premier figurative painters, Manjit Bawa has been drawn to the depiction of gods, men, women, and animals since the very beginning of his career. Pared of all excess detail, Bawa`s figures resemble nothing we have seen or experienced before. As the critic Ranjit Hoskote describes them, “each form, animal and human, rejoices in its plasticity and libidinal energy, its gymnastic ability to defy the strictures of the anatomist. The...One of India`s premier figurative painters, Manjit Bawa has been drawn to the depiction of gods, men, women, and animals since the very beginning of his career. Pared of all excess detail, Bawa`s figures resemble nothing we have seen or experienced before. As the critic Ranjit Hoskote describes them, “each form, animal and human, rejoices in its plasticity and libidinal energy, its gymnastic ability to defy the strictures of the anatomist. The rounded contours of each toy-like figure speak of its prana. The life-breath that gives it a vital buoyancy, allowing it to occupy rather than be trapped in those flat, glowing, single-colour fields of red, yellow, green or blue that are Bawa`s hallmark device” (Manjit Bawa – Modern Miniatures, Recent Paintings, Bose Pacia Modern Exhibition Catalogue, 2000, unpaginated).

These surreal figures do not emerge from a crowded background, but appear almost magically out of the saturated, luminous fields of color that Hoskote describes. The men, women, gods and animals are not narrators, but rather doorkeepers, ushering viewers into Bawa`s dreamlike realm of color and form. Subtle chiaroscuro, delicate tonal contrasts and a perfect rendering of form all lend to the arresting visuals that the artist`s canvases offer. “Oscillating between dignity and playfulness, [these canvases] draw on their creator`s constitutive experiences” which include the religion, traditions, and natural surroundings of his birthplace in Punjab as well as his admiration of Rajput and Pahari miniatures, and his experiences as a silkscreen printer (ibid.).

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